Coverage of the Frisco RoughRiders from the corner of Hicks & Diamond Drive

Results tagged ‘ Trevor Hurley ’

As we mentioned in yesterday’s blog, both Baltimore and Boston had to resort to position players to pitch after using up most of their bullpens. The Red Sox turned to left fielder Darnell McDonald who pitched one inning and picked up the loss. The Orioles called on former RoughRiders first baseman Chris Davis. Davis pitched two shutout innings and picked up the win as Baltimore took the game 9-6.

With this in mind, I began to wonder which position player Frisco would put on the mound. I set out to ask current ‘Riders to see who they thought would be the best fit.

For the pitcher’s perspective, Trevor Hurley was our guy.

“Jurickson Profar. He was initially offered to sign as a pitcher,” Hurley said. “We all know he’s good.”

Profar was a pitcher growing up. He was scouted by many teams including the New York Yankees and Atlanta Braves to pitch but he decided he wanted to be a shortstop instead. The Rangers were the only major league team who wanted to sign Profar to play shortstop.

For the catcher’s perspective, we turned to Zach Zaneski.

“Jared Prince threw in college. Leury Garcia throws 90 plus off the mound. Profar was going to sign with the Yankees as a pitcher,” Zaneski said. “I think those guys are good candidates.”

When asked about him catching for a position player, Zaneski laughed.

“They might be a little wild but it would be fun.”

The last person on our list was Val Majewski who knows a thing or two about moving from position player to pitcher in the middle of a game. In 2010, he pitched an inning for the Midland RockHounds allowing one hit and one strikeout while picking up the save. Last season, Majewski pitched an inning for the Round Rock Express where he picked up another strikeout. He said he’d be a good one to put on the mound but doesn’t necessarily want to.

“If you can see my track record, the stats speak for themselves,” he said with a smile on his face. “I only allowed 1 hit, struck out 2, and have a 0 ERA. I’m not anxious to do it again. I’d rather sit back on my numbers.”

Not only are the RoughRiders covered on pitching, but many of Frisco’s pitchers have had experience as position players as well. For example, Johan Yan was also scouted as a shortstop. With Frisco quite literally having all bases covered, it seems the team is prepared to tackle any challenge.

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